Its Ruins Mr. Bankes
Discovered In Those Of Waadi Mooza, A Village In The Valley Of The Same
Name.
Since Mr. Burckhardt travelled, geographical discoveries have been made in
this part of the world by Messrs.
Ritchie and Lyon, Lord Belmore and Dr.
Richardson, Messrs. Waddington and Hanbury, Messrs. Caillaud and Drovetti,
Sir Archibald Edmonstone, Sir Frederick Henniker, and by an American of the
name of English. The travels of Messrs. Ritchie and Lyon were confined to
Fezzan, and are chiefly curious for the notices they give, derived from
native merchants, of the course of the Niger, By means of the travels of
Lord Belmore and Dr. Richardson, the latitudes and longitudes on the Nile
have been corrected from Assouan to the confines of Dongola. Mr. Waddington
and Mr. Hanbury, taking advantage of an expedition sent into Ethiopia by
the pacha of Egypt, examined this river four hundred miles beyond the place
to which Burckhardt advanced. The travels of the two French gentlemen
extended to the Oasis of Thebes and Dakel, and the deserts situated to the
east and west of the Thebaid. In the Thebaic Oasis some very interesting
remains of antiquity were discovered: the great Oasis was well known to the
ancients; but the Thebaic Oasis has seldom been visited in modern times.
Brown and Poncet passed through its longest extent, but did not see the
ruins observed by Mr. Caillaud.
This gentleman, who was employed by the pacha to search for gold, silver,
and precious stones, after a residence of five months at Sennaar, traversed
the province of Fazocle, and followed the Arrek, till it entered the
kingdom of Bertot. At a place called Singue, in the kingdom of Dar-foke,
which is the southern boundary of Bertot, situated on the tenth parallel of
latitude, and five days' journey to the westward of the confines of
Abyssinia, the conquests of Ishmaei Pacha terminated. Only short notices of
these travels of Mr. Caillaud have as yet been published.
Sir A. Edmonstone's first intention was to visit the Thebaic Oasis; but
understanding from Mr. Belzoni that Mr. Caillaud had already been there,
but that there was another Oasis to the westward, which had never been
visited by any European, he resolved to proceed thither. This Oasis was
also visited by Drovetti much about I he same time: he calls it the Oasis
of Dakel. It seems to have escaped the notice of all the ancient authors
examined by Sir Archibald, except Olympiodorus. Speaking of the Thebaic
Oasis, he mentions an interior and extensive one, lying opposite to the
other, one hundred miles apart, which corresponds with the actual distance
between them.
The American traveller accompanied the expedition of the pacha of Egypt as
far as Sennaar. He commences the account of his voyage up the Nile at the
second cataract; and as far as the pyramids of Meroe, where the voyage of
Messrs. Waddington and Hanbury terminated, his accounts correspond with
what they give. He did not, however, follow the great bend of the river
above Dongola: this he describes as 250 miles long, and full of rocks and
rapid. He again reached the Nile, having crossed the peninsula in a direct
line, at Shendi. Near this place he discovered the remains of a city,
temples, and fifty-four pyramids, which are supposed, by a writer in the
Quarterly Review, to be the ruins of the celebrated Meroc, as their
position agrees with that assigned them by a draughtsman employed by Mr.
Bankes. The army halted on the western bank of the Nile, opposite Halfaia:
about five hours' march above this place the Bahr el Abiad, or White River,
flows into the Bahr el Azreck, or Nile of Bruce. In thirteen days from the
junction of these two rivers, the army, marching along the left, or western
branch of the Azreck, reached Sennaar.
In the year 1817, Delia Cella, an Italian physician, accompanied the army
of the bashaw of Tripoli as far as Bomba, on the route towards Egypt, and
near the frontiers of that country. He had thus an opportunity "of visiting
one of the oldest and most celebrated of the Greek colonies, established
upwards of seven hundred years before the birth of Christ; and in being the
first European to follow the footsteps of Cato round the shores of the
Syrtis, and to explore a region untrodden by Christian foot since the
expulsion of the Romans, the Huns, and the Vandals, by the enterprising
disciples of Mahomet." In this journey he necessarily passed the present
boundary between Tripoli and Bengaze, the same which was anciently the
boundary between Carthage and Cyrene; and our author confirms the account
of Sallust, that neither river nor mountain marks the confines. He also
confirms the description given by Herodotus of the dreadful storms of sand
that frequently arise and overwhelm the caravans in this part of the
Syrtis. At the head of the Syrtis the ground is depressed, and this
depression, our author supposes, continues to the Great Desert. Soon after
he left this barren country, he entered Cyrenaica, the site of Cyrene: that
most ancient and celebrated colony of the Greeks was easily ascertained by
its magnificent ruins. From Cyrene the army marched to Derna, and from this
to the gulf of Bomba, an extensive arm of the sea, where the expedition
terminated.
Such are the most recent discoveries in this portion of Africa.
The settlement of the Cape of Good Hope, originally established by the
Dutch, and at present in possession of the English, was naturally the point
from which European travellers set out to explore the southern parts of
Africa. Their progress hitherto has not been great, though, as far as they
have advanced, the information they have acquired of the face of the
country, its productions, the tribes which inhabit it, and their habits,
manners, &c. may be regarded as full and accurate. The principal travellers
who have visited this part of Africa, and from whose travels the best
information may be obtained of the settlement of the Cape, and of the
country to the north of it for about 900 miles, are Kolbein, Sparman, Le
Vaillant, Barrow, Lichtenstein, La Trobe, Campbell, and Burcheli.
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